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In Progress Let's Play Kerbal Space Program with Real Sol

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
Sep 9, 2007
Messages
7,922
Location
Vault City
I will try a manned landing on Venus with the 3-man capsule(someone already did 1-man in Youtube) once 12+ GHz per core CPUs based on carbon nanotube transistors and 128+ GB DDR8 8000+ Mhz RAM plus motherboards supporting future nanotechnological PC master race show up for sale.

:M

Bump.

*Edit: Update coming soon
 
Last edited:

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
Sep 9, 2007
Messages
7,922
Location
Vault City
You tease. Guess I should go fap to Space.com for now.

While it would be more appropriate to wait for Thursday before giving any reply here...

There were so many wrong things about the Linux version of Kerbal Space Program, starting with the most critical: Not crashing because of too many parts from mods or memory leaks does not make up for over thrice worse performance compared to the Windows version. Furthermore I had to create a symbolic link in a /usr folder for the fonts, otherwise the game would literally have most of its messages glitched because the default fonts folder Debian uses is ignored, and that alone should have convinced me to give up and assume this game does not exist for Linux. It was so horrible I essentially gave up, and at first I was assuming there was no way RSS and most of the mods I was using would work in Windows without crashing, something which proved untrue, so here it is again.

Now. I also changed some stuff, not just some, but a lot. There was something very wrong as well with the mods I used this far: KerbalFuels and ROMini.cfg do more or less the same thing on fuel volumes and engine masses. That means that previously, the reductions towards realism in dry mass to wet mass ratios/etc were applied twice, leading not to realistic weight ratios, but to unrealistically lightweight fuels and engines. I don't care about the specific type of liquid fuel and oxidizer as long as their properties are close to those of real ones in the same way I don't give a fuck about which wood a table is made of in another game that should be about managing and defending fortresses and their inhabitants rather than autism simulation. Fortunately there was a better alternative involving realism without excessive complexities and with the plus of near certain compatibility with most mods "all along" (technically, it was released 3 days after this thread started). Such mod makes parts with fixed fuel types more efficient, so procedural fuel tanks will underperform, but they still have the advantages of flexibility and of having fuel crossfeed through radial attachments without a need for external fuel ducts.

Also, while the vanilla aerodynamics isn't bad since 1.0, it's based on individual parts rather than on the whole shape of the aircraft and it doesn't have supersonic and hypersonic effects. Nonetheless, back when I started this LP, there was a nasty bug in Ferram Aerospace Research involving phantom overheating and parts exploding. It has been fixed since then.

Mods that are closely related are mentioned together.

  • Adjustable Landing Gear: I had enough of failplanes that can't take off until the runway ends because there is no landing gear suitable enough to get them in the right inclination for take off. Likewise, failplanes that veer to the right or to the left a lot during takeoff, often with serious risks of changing direction to a collision course with the spaceplane hangar or elsewhere in the KSC can be mostly prevented with this mod.
  • Advanced Jet Engine, Ferram Aerospace Research: In vanilla you can still achieve suborbital flights with jet aircraft because the vanilla way "air intake" works is totally unrealistic. In AJE, not only the way air intake works is more close to realism, but also all jet engines have speed limits based on how much heat they can endure(IE most turbofans can't go faster than MACH 2.8). Crossing such limits will cause explosions. The mod also includes a realistic ramjet which is ideal for hypersonic flight but sucks at subsonic speeds and requires a minimum velocity before it can generate any thrust at all. As for FAR, it's a requirement for Advanced Jet Engine.
  • B9 Procedural Parts: Procedural wings and control surfaces really help with aircraft building. No more gluing together dozens of stock wings that will wobble a lot during flight.
  • BD Parts Pack: Quite efficient aerodynamic radial retractable rocket engines both regular and VTOL, "T-50 PAK FA" jet engines with vectored thrust and a "spider bot" as a stylish alternative to regular rovers.
  • Better Buoyancy: Everything floats more realistically in the water.
  • Better Time Warp: 5x warp in atmosphere makes the longer ascents and reentries of RSS much less tiresome.
  • Chatterer: Mostly because it can be used to add custom music to the game.
  • Chute Safety Indicator, Safe Chute, EVA Parachutes by Default, RealChute: As long as a Kerbal can jump off the command pod, he might have a chance of surviving even when everything else goes horribly wrong.
  • Civilian Population, USI Kolonization, Extraplanetary Launchpads: Civilian Population is a late game project. Basically it is about putting structures in outer space not for astronauts, but for civilian colonization, tourism and entertainment. Modular and Orbital Kolonization System will be very handy for the former because many of their parts can be useful for civilian population building. Both mods also use EL, allowing for the construction of spacecrafts in outer space and low gravity bodies with permanent bases and settlements. This of course is all late game stuff.
  • Coherent Contracts, Contract Configurator, Contract Packs: Advanced Progression, Kerbin Space Station, RemoteTech, Rover Missions, SCANSat Lite, Tourism Plus, Kerbal Aircraft Builders: More variety of contracts for Career Mode, less eye-bleeding buzzwords in contract descriptions.
  • Critical Temperature Gauge + RealHeat: RealHeat improves stock heat physics, arguably makes Deadly Reentry "redundant" and is one of the components of RealismOverhaul. The other mod shows the maximum temperature in one of the parts of a vessel whenever it gets too hot. Engines will heat up a lot more and without radiators they take a long time to cool down in vacuum, specially in long burns.
  • Crowd Sourced Science: More varied descriptions for science experiments. Unfortunately most of such descriptions don't apply to the Real Solar System bodies.
  • Dynamic Deflection + Advanced Fly-by-Wire Controls + PilotAssist: Responsiveness of control surfaces such as elevons is adjusted based on factors such as current speed, altitude etc. Better support for joysticks than vanilla and atmospheric autopilot + adjustable stock SAS + atmospheric SAS(SSAS)
  • G-Effects: 15G or more for a while can kill a Kerbal and excessive Gs are now a real problem.
  • Kerbal Alarm Clock: Essentially a must have.
  • Kerbal Attachment System, Kerbal Inventory System: Very useful and a simpler alternative to Infernal Robotics*. Robotics don't really fit with the theme of this one, after all.
  • Kerbal Engineer Redux: really, really helps with designing spacecraft.
  • Kerbal Joint Reinforcement: Essential to prevent large spacecraft from being shattered into pieces due to aerodynamic pressures, etc.
  • KSC Switcher: Without it you're stuck to the default launch center in vanilla and to Cape Canaveral in RSS.
  • Menu Stabilizer: Right-click on menus in the default toolbar to have their positions locked.
  • Modular Rocket Systems LITE: Regardless of plausibility, Atomic Age features what is for gameplay purposes a cheat engine. This stockalike pack has a more sensible alternative when more powerful nuclear propulsion is needed: a quad nuclear engine with slightly better but still poor TWR compared to the stock one which also sucks for anything atmospheric. In truth I wanted the Orion "old boom-boom" Nuclear Pulse Drive as a late game wonder but it will probably remain incompatible with 1.x for a long time.
  • No More Science Grinding: Doing the same experiment at the same place again and again is banal, shit, boring.
  • Procedural Fairings for Everything: More options and textures than stock fairings.
  • Procedural Parts: Custom-tailored SRBs, fuel tanks, decouplers and adapters, maximum dimensions limited by technology in Career mode.
  • RasterPropMonitor: Being able to put an external camera connected to a MFD in a stock command pod makes IVA much better, but still external shots are better for the sake of a LP.
  • Real Solar System: Kerbol is an "extended tutorial" compared to the real deal. This mod naturally includes textures based on recent Pluto images.
  • Remote Tech + RT RSS Configuration: Gives a real purpose for satellites because probes can't be operated without a line of communications between them and one of the many ground stations RSS Configuration for this mod adds to Earth. Also a requirement of the RemoteTech Contract Pack, obviously.
  • RoverSpeed and Rover Wheel sounds: Stop rover wheels from breaking at high speeds and obviously add SFX to them.
  • SCANsat: Mapping topography, biomes and resources in Earth and beyond, plus new contracts in Career mode.
  • ShipManifest: Mostly to rename Kerbals. Haven't used much of its other features yet.
  • ShowAllFuels: All types of masses being consumed in a given stage will be shown, instead of LF only.
  • SMURFF: It's simpler and more universal than other mods that adjust fuel fractions and engine masses in all existing parts for the sake of realism, which is critical in RSS. Dedicated fuel tanks are more efficient, but procedural tanks still have their uses.
  • Sound Muffler: In space, nobody can hear you scream.
  • SpaceY Heavy Lifters Pack, SpaceY Expanded: Because I got TweakScale in addition to Procedural Parts, I deleted all engines and fuel tanks in these packs, but the other parts they feature with diameters up to 10 meters cannot be so easily replaced by PP or TweakScale. Obviously inspired by SpaceX.
  • Stock Bug Fix Modules, ModuleRCSFX: Any modding setup for this game should have at least these unofficial bugfix mods.
  • TAC Fuel Balancer: Balances fuel drain during flight to improve stability.
  • Trajectories: Displays the atmospheric trajectory of the vessel and calculates where it will land during reentry. Any ISRU idea involving shipping stuff back to Earth with drop pods constructed on the Moon will be much more practical with this mod, and ensuring maximum recovery for parts will be less difficult too.
  • TweakScale: Why have ten pages of engines when you can just resize fewer ones up and down? Also works with near every part in the game. Essential mod for the Real Solar System.
  • USI Life Support: Yes. I ditched TAC Life Support because I don't mind abstraction. While in the default settings this mod is much more forgiving and doesn't cause death due to loss of life support, I changed such options so if LS runs out it's mission over for reals, and the abstracted "supplies" and "mulch" have about the same average masses as separate oxygen, food, water, waste, waste water and carbon dioxide storages would have in TAC Life Support.
  • Waypoint Manager: waypoints being visible in EVA and rover driving makes rover and EVA missions a lot more convenient for obvious reasons.


*Except for something like using Infernal Robotics for swing wings.

I decided against reinstalling some of the mods I had installed in Linux. If I end up missing the parts from the mods I ditched, I may add more, but for now, this will be it. Community Tech Tree not only is not really intended for RSS, but also it is way too grindy. Getting into orbit is already near the limits of the existing tech as you might notice in this update.

PS: To reiterate, it is a shame this still doesn't work in 1.x. While it may be as much of a "cheat engine" as the "Lightbulb" from Atomic Age, when nuclear bombs are driving a rocket forward, why should I care? Also, a self-imposed LARP rule of refusing to activate such an engine in atmosphere and setting its price close to 1 million more than balance its super ISP and thrust out IMO

:kwafuckyeah:

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PS2: Advanced Fly By Wire disables SAS by default. Not realizing that felt really stupid.

That RemoteTech Contract to build communications networks in orbit, it is really one hell of a contract, and there are versions of it for other celestial bodies besides Earth too. Even unmanned stuff are great achievements with RSS, after all, but there will be some manned fun in the end of this update anticipated from Thursday.

================================

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Morgan Interstellar Tourism

"There is no better tax heaven than Outer Space. The entry costs may be astronomical, but the future astronomical and 100% tax-free profits will more than make up for it."

-- CEO Nwabudike Morgan, "The Ethics of Greed"​

Morgan Industries


A long project was finally over. In the Republic of Congo, near the town of Makoua, a new private owned Space Center was finally ready for operations, positioned very much in the equator. Such infrastructure wasn't cheap, but the rockets would no longer have to be as large as they once were thanks to such highly beneficial equatorial location. Morgan Interstellar still had much to do before even trying more manned missions with a higher complexity than sending a lone man to orbit. For one, the communications network with full coverage near the equator would be a very intensive project, but there were other projects as well, such as sending a satellite with, for some reason, a thermometer, to a equatorial orbit unrelated to the still far from finished orbital communications network.

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Thermosat I was a "routine" mission, and it included some much needed improvements over previous launcher designs, such as having winglets for a change so there will be more means to avoid tumbling and flipping towards the wrong direction during the ascent than praying. 65 tons to get this into a low orbit. A manned mission to the Moon will certainly require a much bigger and heavier rocket.

(Notes: With stock aerodynamics, a rocket like this without control surfaces can just barely remain under control during early ascent. With Ferram Aerospace Research, launching rockets of such size without aerodynamic control surfaces is certain failure)

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The initial stage of Thermosat I was ejected without complications. While the arrangement of three engines in the next stage was unusual, it proved itself quite stable so far, far more stable than having engines beneath every radial cluster of fuel tanks.

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Oops. While nothing really bad happened, the separation of the second stage was not quiet or 100% safe. It fell apart into little pieces but fortunately the rest of the rocket was still in one piece, and that is always very good because the budget isn't that large to allow fuckups, even when nobody dies.

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Fourth Stage. Studies discover why the previous separation was so hot: attaching several tanks directly to each other in a radial pattern is dangerous because of minor imperfections in the soldering and using radial decouplers may be a better idea than this, specially on very large rockets, not counting the fact that fixed tanks for LFO or Liquid Fuel only have better fuel fractions anyway.

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In outer space, Thermosat I proves that it had about enough Delta-v for its intended mission. The final separation went with no problems. Another mission accomplished, but there was much yet to be done. Going to the Moon? The current communications technology of Morgan Interstellar can't even reach that far away for unmanned probes in the first place. And manned missions would be probably well beyond the the limits of how big rockets without struts can be without falling into pieces during ascent.

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There was another, much more challenging satellite contract to get a satellite with a thermometer into a retrograde, inclined and quite far away orbit. Based on studies on the previous launch, procedural tanks soldered radially were utterly ditched. Instead, side boosters that would run out of fuel by the time the central thrusters should gain enough thrust-to-weight ratio to keep going up on their own will be used in the brand new Thermosphere I, which if successful will also be the basis for the launchers of future Communications Satellites. However, its Delta-v might not be large enough for this. Only one way to know.

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During the ejection of the SRBs of the first tage, one of the few flaws of the new Morgan Interstellar Space Center near the Congolese town of Makoua can be noticed: its runway doesn't go from west to east, but that dirt runway will never get off anything more complex than a crop duster airplane, so that isn't really much of a big deal for now and even then, jet engines are so efficient that there won't be that much Delta-v loss from changing course to east after takeoff: takeoff from a real airfield rather than from that cheap low budget runway, of course. But given Morgan and the African Union don't even have technology to build jets, that one will remain like that for a while.

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The lowermost radial boosters run out of fuel sooner than the remaining engine could reach a TWR higher than 1. It was a serious miscalculation, but maybe there is still a chance of this working given how high up the rocket already is. Naturally, it is going into an inclined retrograde orbit, which should get close enough to the intended one for the contract and of course is a lot more expensive than one that isn't opposed to Earth's rotation.

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Fortunately, in spite of one of the stages remaining below 1.0 TWR for a while, the Thermosphere I still managed to have enough for a stable orbit to be possible, but fuel was running out an an orbit over 13,000 kilometers away from Earth isn't cheap.

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Predictably, it did not even get close to the intended orbit. However, in spite of this failure, the Thermosphere I launcher proved to be very reliable, and with a few extra tanks and further adjustments, it could be perfect for the creation of a communication network with four satellites having full coverage of Earth's surface and LEO. Thus, CommSat II was created based on the Thermosphere launcher, and there were still three satellites left to put into near identical orbits for that purpose.

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So far, everything repeated itself in the same way, nothing wrong here... besides the boosters crashing dangerously close to the Launch Center.

One of the differences of this new launcher design is combining the simpler yet more powerful LVT-30 "Reliant" engines radially to the thrust vectoring capability of a LVT-45 "Swivel", and this time, by the time the radial liquid fuel boosters run out of fuel the main engine in this stage should have more than enough TWR to do its job. Also a Kerbal Engineer system was attached to the satellite so useful information can be displayed during the flight.

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This time it worked very nicely. The angle of ascent will remain high because the plan is to climb to over two thousand kilometers of apoapsis before stabilizing the orbit. It may be less efficient or not than achieving a stable low earth orbit first, but it is the only way to prevent for sure loss of communications between mission control and this satellite during its maneuvers.

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Almost in outer space and there is still one stage left before the final one. This might actually work exactly as planned for a change. Or mostly exactly as planned.

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Still a long way to go, but the most fuel-costly part of this mission is already completed and at higher orbits, there won't be the need to accelerate as much as in LEO. Furthermore, keeping the thrust right in the middle between prograde and normal proved to be a lot more efficient than initially thought, but may still be less efficient than going LEO at first.

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Finally, it was ready for the final maneuver. Much of the work was already done by previous stages, but it consumed almost all of the fuel in the last stage.

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A successful link is established with the previous communications satellite of Morgan Interstellar, but its orbit is higher, and this isn't going to make a stable communications network practical. CommSat I was maneuvered to match orbit with CommSat II. Fortunately it still had enough fuel left for it.

Meanwhile a new contract for a satellite in a retrograde equatorial orbit was signed, and it would push the launcher design used in the CommSat II to its limits.

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Fortunately, that design had just enough Delta-V for this particular orbit. The extra funds from this success make the continuation of the creation of the Communications Network across Earth's orbit less tense than before. Two more satellites, CommSat III and CommSat IV are successfully launched, each about 90 degrees away from each other like corners of a square. Unfortunately however, it becomes obvious that there was a huge mistake in the very first launch because such a network requires a stable set of links between all of such four satellites which will resemble a square together, but CommSat I had a severe mistake in its design.

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It was made with only one antenna with enough range to communicate with another of the satellites in the network, and it needed to communicate with both CommSat II and CommSat IV. Therefore, it was another wasteful failure, and a new CommSat I would have to be launched too. At least it was just one more remaining, and then this would finally be over.

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Nevertheless, from mud huts to this, over 2 thousand kilometers over Africa and the Indian Ocean, all thanks to the genius of CEO Nwabudike Morgan.

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Unfortunately, that minimum periapsis for this contract is truly minimum, for it will only allow for a perfectly stable line of communications between all the four satellites if they are perfectly equidistant, and that obviously did not happen. Rather than painstakingly trying to fix their distances to each other until they are all the same, given they still have enough fuel for a somewhat higher orbit, they are all maneuvered to an almost perfectly circular one above 3,000 km, and then there will be some extra maneuvers to be done to make the difference in distances between each other as small as possible and ensure the links between them will form a constant square that will cover pretty much anything underneath them and in most latitudes across the planet, as their long range comm antennas have a radius of 45 degrees, which will cover a lot at such altitudes.

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CommSat III was intentionally left with a higher apoapsis than the others to make the distance between it, Commsat II and IV as equal as possible. Fuel for such maneuvers was running out, so the maneuver was not too risky, and it would take several days for the distance change to finally lead to the final step of this long going project that went through several hurdles so far. It's no GPS, but it's not like there is a lot of demand for a new GPS right now. This project was finally getting close to conclusion.

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Now, if the orbits are sufficiently close to each other, this network will remain perfectly online for 12 hours, and a very generous payment from many who benefit from a cheaper native telecom industry with their own satellites will be granted.

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FINALLY! MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

Now probes can be controlled practically from anywhere in orbits beneath 3,200 kilometers which will really help with future unmanned missions.

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With the extra funding, the Administrative Center of the Morgan Interstellar Space Center was upgraded, and new policies were enacted to maximize the much needed technological progress for something still so beyond possibility as reaching the Moon to finally happen.

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The next step in the big picture was to rendezvous two vessels in orbit, but there was a bigger, more PR-friendly mission to be done: starting up Morgan Interstellar's Space Tourism branch. An eccentric millionaire contacted the corporation and offered a lot to have a chance to stay in Earth's orbit. To send two men into space was pushing above and beyond the capabilities of the rudimentary technologies of the African Union and Morgan Interstellar, but it wasn't impossible, and some new radial thrusters may be just what is needed to achieved the first two-man strong orbital mission of Morgan Interstellar and, most importantly, the very first orbital space tourism flight in the history of mankind.

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Morgan B.D. was one of the subsidiaries of Morgan Industries responsible for researching, developing and constructing rocket engines. They were small time compared to the bigger names, but they had a history of excellence. At this moment there were only two types of radially attached engines available to Morgan Interstellar: the first was a crappy model with poor aerodynamics. The second was BD's radial thrusters, which sacrificed thrust to weight ratio for a somewhat better specific impulse compared to other rocket engines and for having a much more aerodynamic shape. They also had retractable nozzles that closed when inactive, specially useful for retro thrusters, but that idea was for the future. Such radially attached engines proved just perfect for the Spaceliner 1, now to design its launcher, which would certainly be very, very large.

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Of course all precautions to prevent a crippling lawsuit should Tito not return alive from this massive rocket were taken, and he did not hesitate to sign a waiver together with witnesses from his family, who were not so eager about his desire to go to space as he was at the time, for they were afraid he would not come back alive. One of the reasons the Morgan Interstellar Spaceliner 1 uses airplane styled inline cockpits despite the fact theyare slightly bigger than the heatshield beneath both is because sitting on a cockpit would give to the tourist a much better view of outer space, of course, but most importantly because Potatojohn said he had a seriously bad feeling about the idea of using two Mk1 Command Pods instead.

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Unreal: Return to Napali theme

Like its smaller brothers for unmanned spacecraft, the launch vehicle for the Spaceliner 1 also used radial boosters that would be ejected first than the more central ones. Tito was starting to show he may have regretted his decision of paying for this, but now it was too late. Trying to abort now would mean certain death. There was only one way to go until the tour was completed.

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For the time being, this flight was going alright, but it was always a gambit. The real gambit will only happen however by the time atmospheric reentry starts.

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One thing about radial engines. Depending on where they are locking their gimbals might or not be a good idea. In case of the current ones after the previous stage ran out of fuel, it is a bad idea as their vectored thrust will assist with the main engine. In case of the next one, it is a very good idea because the final propelled stage has its engines placed exactly at the center of gravity of the same and multiple reaction wheels at each end of the same for the sake of attitude control.

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Tito may soon be remembered as the first tourist to reach Earth's Orbit, provided there was no miscalculation and the fuel will suffice for achieving orbit. The reaction wheels on the rear end of this final propelled stage were inactive before because their torque could have caused unwanted stress in the fuselage, but after the previous one was decoupled, they were immediately activated, because the exhaust of the radial engines would touch the fuselage were their gimbals not locked, causing all sorts of problems involving complete loss of control over the direction the spacecraft is heading to. The wheels would be doing the attitude control instead.

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Now Potatojohn will need patience because Tito really wanted to stay at least 4 hours in orbit. He is amazed despite how little room he has in the cockpit, looking through the glass at the stars, at the blue planet beneath him. Provided he returns alive, this will be a great first civilian space trip.

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After Tito was satisfied, the orbit was circularized at Periapsis and then set for reentry, with Periapsis at about 46 km which hopefully won't end in a tragedy in what will be by far the hardest part of this mission given the limited heatshield employed by the final descent and landing stage.

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Thanks to advanced algorithms, the descent was set to happen relatively close to the Space Center for the sake of convenience. This was after all the first run of Morgan Interstellar Space Tourism's freshly opened division, they really wanted to impress.

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Tito was so ecstatic he wasn't even afraid when he could see the scorching heat wave and starting to feel the Gs behind him. Thanks to the Surface SAS the escape module was holding on for now, but occasionally searing heat passing through one of the cockpits. It was really tense and there was no doubt just one little mistake, one little wrong pull of the flight stick, that would mean certain death for both pilot and passenger. This had to be perfect, and back on the surface it was decided until better technologies are available, further tourism missions will have to wait.

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They are passing over the Space Center, the heat is increasing, and now comes the decisive moment in reentry.

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Luckily Tito did not have lunch before this flight, and the G forces while very unpleasant at the most extreme point of reentry never were high enough for the tourist to have any complications that would demand medical attention. Yet, just one tiny mistake, one little flaw... it was always on a razor thin edge. This entire mission was very risky, but it may yet be worth it, even if its profit margin because of outsourced research will be small.

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Whew.

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Three parachutes are activated. Hopefully they won't be eaten by a lion, although it's not like a lion will be at the LZ or something like that.

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Another milestone is thus achieved: the first truly orbital touristic travel on Earth! Lessons are learned, but technology remains the same for now. The long, hard and stony road to the Moon is still not over. There is still much to be achieved and done before reaching the Moon can be considered practical. Next immediate step will be to park a probe into orbit with one of the existing satellites and then wrap up remaining satellite contracts, and be ready for whatever challenges may lie ahead, but many important steps were already made, because like a man in NASA back when it was active in the real deal instead of a joke said, the giant leap for mankind is not the first step on the Moon, but in attaining Earth orbit.

TO BE CONTINUED
 
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Data4

Arcane
Joined
Sep 11, 2005
Messages
5,529
Location
Over there.
I've changed how I play KSP for now. I've been following a few KSP streamers lately, and one of them is a huge shuttlehead named ej_sa who does amazing work with just a stock install. I've decided to follow that lead and go *mostly* stock. I use a few key mods, namely Kerbal Engineer and procedural parts, but my focus is going to be on heavy shuttles and SSTO space planes while keeping as light weight an installation as possible. So far, it's working pretty good, with performance staying high, despite crafts with part counts in the multi hundreds. I'll post pics in the screenshot thread if I come up with something amazing.
 

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
Sep 9, 2007
Messages
7,922
Location
Vault City
From my experience RSS isn't a performance drain by itself unless you install RVE as well for clouds, auroras, lightning etc. It's hard to explain why given it's arguably "boring" from a certain point of view and more demanding in patience, but after playing this game with the Real Solar System, I really don't want to ever bother with the stock Kerbol again.

I tried to go as far as possible without resorting to TweakScale which can render the tech progression in Career Mode mostly "obsolete" except scaled up parts are always less efficient and more expensive compared to parts that have such size by default. I reached such limit by this update, and it was to be expected given the incompatibility between stock tech tree and RSS.

By the way, I haven't recruited many pilots yet because that is expensive and I need to save funds for upgrading the R&D facility before being able to go far.

=====================

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The Xu Program

"From a purely economical point of view, many manned space missions from the last century have very little worth. However, many investors, specially the government of the African Union, consider retracing the steps of the Apollo Program something with so much sentimental and political value they are willing to more than cover the costs. Besides, given we just commenced business in the pioneer field of space tourism, I am sure someone would be willing to pay a fortune to personally be there, if only we can prove such a voyage is possible and with a mostly guaranteed return home. Those are the reasons for the Xu Program, named after the sky god in the mythology of the San people who inhabit my homeland. Let us be remembered forever as the first private corporation to send a man to the Moon."

--CEO Nwabudike Morgan​

Theme

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It's time to prove a simple yet critical capability for future space missions: the capability of parking two separate spacecrafts in the same orbit. Docking was out of question due to the still rudimentary technology available to the company because of the Second Dark Ages that followed the self-inflicted death of Western Civilization, despite the arrival many European refugees ironically and paradoxically to Southwest Africa and Namibia in particular after their own homes became Islamic shitholes, for none of them had enough technological expertise originated from their fallen civilizations to contribute much. For all practical purposes, space technology still remained stuck in the equivalent of the 1950s besides a better technological foundation, a level where something this simple was still noteworthy. It would be the first orbital parking of Morgan Interstellar.

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The first attempts did not work because of power outages in this test satellite due to limited battery capacity, but eventually a proper maneuver worked to meet up CommSat III.

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The request for this particular mission came directly from the African Union's government. Perhaps they were hoping for something much bigger.

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With the new experiences gained lately and the outsourced R&D and unpaid R&D programs, better components are developed, critical components to ensure lesser risks of tragedies happening. Improving structural integrity will become critical, specially for the far away dream of reaching much farther than Earth's orbit.

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Morgan Interstellar technology was a decade behind the technology the United States had available by the time the Apollo Program commenced. Nonetheless, this mission from the African Union to fly by the Moon was accepted, although there was much yet to be done before attempting such a bold feat. First, a successful Polar trip would serve as a good indicator of this much bolder possibility, but sending only one tourist there would not be worth it, specially because 30% of all income was being diverted to R&D.

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Space travel is the hard. Only 200 extra kilograms for this particular contract meant that a similar Delta-v to the one of the launcher used by the CommSat models would demand for eighteen radial boosters total instead of twelve, dozens of tons heavier.

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Polar orbits also required a very different angle of ascent.

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Before even dreaming of the Moon, it was decided to finish all satellite contracts, for if they can't put a satellite over 12,000 km above Earth, they will never manage to send anyone or anything there.

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And so several satellites would be launched, mostly using the launchers of the CommSat program.

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After all, the payment for such deployments was very good. But eventually there was a need of bigger rockets before trying anything. Two space tourists wanted to gaze upon the frozen expanses of the South Pole in Antarctica from outer space, and they paid premium for it. Sending them there wouldn't be cheap with the rudimentary technology available, for over-engineering crude technology isn't efficient, but it had to be done and it would be done. If Morgan Interstellar can't pull this off, a travel to the Moon will never happen.

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Building a twice larger variant of the largest heatshield available was costly, as was costly building much larger versions of the existing components for the sake of creating a rocket with room for 3 capable of a Polar near-orbit to pass over the South Pole. The super scaled booster for example was very costly, but still cheaper than a solution using liquid fuel and oxidizer for this one and packing more than enough punch and fuel to let the other stages operate at maximum efficiency outside the atmosphere. Named Rocketmountains of Madness after a certain horror story involving Antarctica, this was the largest rocket ever devised by Morgan, and it would probably not be enough for a Moon landing with only one man, or perhaps even for a flyby.

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Bastard 4, the rookie of the three-man crew left after Ulminati 's tragic early death because of an incompetent forgetting to add a decoupler between the command pod and the rest of the first, inefficient and crude Troposphere I rocket, was tasked to send these two tourists to a sightseeing in a travel they would probably never forget.

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The booster with 5 meters of diameter runs out as atmosphere becomes very thin, a perfect altitude for the next stage.

(Unfortunately TweakScale doesn't scale up the emissions from rocket engines so they end becoming hilariously tiny compared to the rockets emitting them.)

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During the ascent an orbital correction maneuver begins to cut off all acceleration from Earth's rotation and ensure the South Pole will not be missed.

(Trying this kind of mission without the Waypoint Manager mod is a bad idea)

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At the final propelled stage, already in outer space, the acceleration to ensure a flyby of the South Pole and a successful reentry commences. Delta-v should be about enough. Thanks to many advanced instruments this maneuver has happened so far in a very precise manner.

(Pilot Assistant is useful for controlling vertical speed through inclination and throttling in orbit and for getting very accurate info on heading too. SSAS locks heading and inclination, or tries to sometimes, which is super useful when it works)

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There were some problems during this touristic travel. The engines began to overheat to dangerous levels. It was necessary to further pitch up to avoid losing altitude then throttle down just to be safe, and there was still a long way to accelerate to.

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Fortunately this wasn't a failure, and now it was only a matter of waiting and not fucking up during reentry, which could only happen at the "night side" of the Earth.

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Orbald: Did you see that?

Carol: What?

Orbald: That black spot in the middle of the ice, it doesn't look natural. It looks like a city.

Carol: I don't see anything weird down there, must be your imagination.

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Or perhaps, deep beneath them lies a Prisoner of Ice... in any case, the mission is mostly accomplished, all Bastard4 has to do now is to ensure they will all return alive.

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They descend gazing upon the last lights of the sun.

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Far from the most dangerous reentry, it was quite "smooth" all things considered, not bad for positive PR on Space Tourism and the enlarged heatshield worked perfectly.

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Two extra radial chutes were included in this one, and there were no problems with their activation.

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This wasn't very profitable, but it was good for the contributions to science such funds also ensured.

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Then, the remaining satellite contracts would be better served with a similar design paradigm like in the Medium Earth Orbit - 1, given that the old CommSat designs probably lacked Delta-V to do such orbits this high: BIGGER IS BETTER.

:mrpresident:

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MEO-1 had perhaps a little too much spare fuel after the maneuver was completed, but it paid off, so it was OK.

There was a much harder contract however, one that has been attempted once with a satellite that would never have enough fuel for such an orbit, one that required a very specific time of the day to be attempted.

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The time was right for a second try of this high, retrograde and inclined orbit.

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Contracts like the one this massive rocket was designed for would be avoided in the future because their rewards aren't that better compared to the ones of much easier orbits, but if successful it would be a nice aid to the communications network of Morgan Interstellar and Morgan Telecom.

Some nutjobs were starting to claim these vehicles were just ICBMs without nuclear warheads. Nice joke.

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The orbit required in this mission demands for a very specific heading as well. Anything against the axis of Earth's rotation is always harder, which is why the rocket is so massive compared to previous ones despite the final payload being so small... despite an inefficient ascent plan, that is, but gaps in the communications network still exist and this was also a test of the limits of the available technology.

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This was the last pending satellite contract. The time was drawing near for the boldest mission ever undertaken by Morgan Interstellar and the African Union they contractually represent: the journey to the Moon.

Theme

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Apollo-1 was a disaster back then, leading to the death of the entire crew. Xu-1 would be a much simpler rocket: every step was taken to ensure the minimum possible payload, including this having only one man in the crew, despite the inherent risks in doing so. There would be no landing, it would be just a flyby and perhaps an orbit, and hopefully a successful return home. Bastard4 would have the honor of being the first commercial astronaut to orbit the Moon. Among the weight-saving measures was putting life support supplies on the seat and hoping that would work because soldering them outside the pod would hurt aerodynamics.

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Unfortunately the first launch had to be aborted. Soldering life support supplies outside will be the only way that won't add to much extra mass. This was also designed for being the cheapest possible practical rocket to reach the Moon and in this case a liquid fuel first stage proved to be more economical. Furthermore, no RCS, no fancy stuff at all, Xu-1 it was very barebones, but future rockets of the Xu Program would probably be more complex by necessity. Now, comes the moment of truth, the countdown repeats again, and this time there will be no turning back in 10, 9...

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Almost a century has passed since the last time a mission of this magnitude was attempted and succeeded. History is being written.

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First stage ejected, an inclined orbit is sought to minimize the angular differences to Moon's orbit in the ascending and descending nodes because of Earth's axial tilt.

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The second stage almost achieved a stable orbit. According to the calculations this final stage should have enough fuel to reach the Moon and, given no mistakes in the return maneuvering, go back to Earth.

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But it will be tight, if this fuel is enough to return to Earth, which hopefully will be.

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So close, but Bastard4 unfortunately will be very far away from taking a small step for a man yet another great leap for mankind because even more Delta-V and technology beyond their grasp will be required for that.

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The pale blue dot becomes smaller in the horizon as some uninformed amateur observers attempt to spot Xu-1 from the night skies across Africa.

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Almost 4 days later, the Moon is in sight, and this great achievement is finally made. However, the existing trajectory will jettison Xu-1 out of Earth's orbit. Some careful adjustments in lunar orbit will be necessary to ensure the gravity there will slingshot it back to Earth instead.

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In any case, he will be forever remembered as the first commercial astronaut in this place, but will he live to tell the history of such a feat?

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After a very irregular orbit is achieved, because it is a polar orbit around the Moon, the first thing before an attempt to return to Earth will be a critical change of its inclination at its most distant point, to save as much Delta-V as possible, for fuel is running out. This will be just barely enough, if it works.

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After the change of inclination, a proper maneuvering solution was found but given how little fuel remained, Bastard4 had no choice but to risk a very dangerous aerobraking on Earth.

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One final glance to the ever distant Moon as the maneuver is complete. It will take many hours before Xu-1 finally leaves the sphere of influence of the Moon. If Bastard4 survives, he will bring very valuable knowledge back.

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His food, air and water supplies won't last more than twelve days at most, there is truly no choice but aerobraking.

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The maneuver leads to the predicted results, and now hopefully the aerobraking will not be a tragedy.

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Something very, very weird happened during the first atmospheric pass and aerobraking, but it seems to have worked. During the next apoapsis, finishing this orbit for real will be necessary because there isn't enough fuel to reduce orbit another way and life support won't last enough for a safer, slower deceleration towards reentry.

(Forgot to reduce time acceleration and when it got to 1x the vessel was already back in outer space... at least there was no Kraken this time)

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Hopefully this is the correct way to avoid dying in a very dangerous reentry from a high earth orbit. Periapsis set at ten kilometers higher than the usual for such maneuvers. It will be certainly a difficult one, Bastard4's life possibly becoming as threatened as thin thread passing over a razor's edge.

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Over Africa, with Suez in sight, the most hellish part of the reentry happened. The pod was barely holding up, very, very close to its complete disintegration. People looked to the skies of Egypt with fear and concern. Would the very simpler beginning of the African Union's lunar program end as a tragedy?

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Keeping the pod in the right position was hard, and the scorching touch of death did not give up its attempt to claim another life as the Middle East was being crossed.

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If not the heat, G-forces could also kill in a poorly planned reentry, but as the altitude and speed decreased, hopes grew this would actually succeed.

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Bastard4 began to suffer from redout due to how extreme the G became during this point, but now the worst already passed.

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Finally!

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The first commercial astronaut to orbit the Moon returns in one piece! This is truly a great day and with the scientific gains from such a mission, many important steps will be finally completed towards the possibility of finally not only flying over the Moon and returning home by a very close call, but for landing on it!

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TO BE CONTINUED
 
Last edited:

Data4

Arcane
Joined
Sep 11, 2005
Messages
5,529
Location
Over there.
Not bad for a nappy headed kid who, just 5 years ago, was scrapping through the wasteland streets of Monrovia Liberia, sucking dick for heroin, and sleeping in yak shit.
 

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
Sep 9, 2007
Messages
7,922
Location
Vault City
The people from Kishasa laugh. When Poposhere 6 launches, it will blow all this away!

Sure, by blowing up in the first 5 seconds after launch.

Not bad for a nappy headed kid who, just 5 years ago, was scrapping through the wasteland streets of Monrovia Liberia, sucking dick for heroin, and sleeping in yak shit.


The first words of such a kid on the Moon would be quite predictable. No "This is a small step for a man but a great leap for mankind", but something completely different.

Now, I'm tempted to increase mission rewards at least threefold because with RSS, anything outside a simple Earth orbit is expensive as fuck in career mode and the grind is starting to really become painful, although I was mostly after science in this one because bigger and better engines are a critical need. Should I edit contract settings to fix this? You'll see by the end of this update why I am asking such a question although getting to the super heavy rockets tech and nuclear propulsion should make the price for going father than LEO somewhat smaller, but not small enough.

Also I tried to take chances with better resolution textures for the RSS(not the best, but better than the ones I used before). It worked. Likewise, realizing how much TweakScale scales up prices, I am using the full set of SpaceY parts now because later on they will be among the few that can do the job in the Real Solar System for more ambitious missions without resorting to nuclear power or ion thrusters for unmanned missions or to insane quantities of parts. Speaking of insane quantities of parts... you will see.

Also, Hangar Extender is a must have for RSS.

======================================

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Windhoek, we have a Problem

"You have an almost childish understanding of the costs involved in space exploration. Your financial aid for a lunar landing is pitiful. We will only agree with it and put your flag on the Moon, this time, provided full rights over all scientific data of worth gathered from such mission, but we will want triple funding than that in the future, or missions anywhere farther than Earth's orbit shall never, ever happen."

-- CEO Nwabudike Morgan​


James Horner: The Launch

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Much knowledge was gained from recent missions, and a critical component to reduce costs of future launches is finally viable: stages with tanks that can be ejected after emptied, connected to engines placed above them to both reduce costs and maximize Delta-V. Furthermore, larger fuel tanks are no brainers, as the costs of scaling up smaller tanks are much higher. With this knowledge a new, more cost-effective generation of satellite launchers is developed.

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Costing less than 50,000(,000) , this second generation of Satellite Launchers succeeds in being far more profitable, but soon contracts with higher requirements demand a different approach than multiple cheap radial boosters as the first stage.

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The MR(Medium Range) version of the same design ditches radial boosters for a single and very big booster that has been considerably increased compared to the original dimensions of the design.

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There is a tourist crazy enough to want a flyby to the Moon, but the problem is that sending two people to the Moon is a lot more expensive, but there was a plan to make it worth once the technology acquired by Morgan Interstellar turns it into a possibility.

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More "routine" missions happen, until another important step towards the conclusion of the Xu Program is finished: the creation of proper landing systems for a Lunar lander. But a landing on the Moon will be a real challenge, a much greater challenge than any previous mission.

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Satellites were good for profit because sending unmanned payloads to orbit was much cheaper than anything manned.

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And the reward offered for a lunar landing, it was completely unfair, way too cheap given the challenges such a mission would involve. This would be the last one under such terms. Same on how much that crazy tourist paid for a flyby to the Moon. Prices will have to be increased or any mistake will mean bankrupcy and any mission more complex than a satellite will barely break even at best.

(Later you will see why. I really did it wrong with the reward modifier, again.)

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Before such a bold goal is even attempted, more lucrative and easier missions continued being sought.

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While Bastard 4 was being trained for a future Lunar mission, potatojohn and SmartCheetah are called to pilot Morgan Spaceliner Two and bring these tourists to see Earth from above and further tourists as this is intended to become as "routine" as space flight can be, for profit of course. If successful, this will be the first 4-manned orbital flight of Morgan Interstellar with the three tourists. He climbs the elevator of the launch tower and gets to the capsule where the tourists were already waiting. While being upside down is unpleasant, future touristic missions to Earth's orbit would require it for cost saving because these capsules are more lightweight than space-worthy cockpits. Three tourists wanted it, and the pay this time made it a lucrative endeavor, provided nothing goes wrong. Nevertheless even lucrative manned missions had a not so good profit margin given the risks involved. Rising prices and firing whoever came up with the current pricing policy for spaceplane tickets is a good idea as well.

(I installed FASA towers and clamps because they are much better than vanilla ones, specially for the necessarily much larger rockets RSS entails.)

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Booster ejected. All is going well.

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Second stage ejected. Commencing final orbital maneuver.

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The first flight of Morgan Spaceliner Two was a complete success so far. Now all that is left is surviving reentry.

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It worked quite well.

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And so space tourism would become a constant for many days.

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So routine even night launches weren't discarded. All went well again.

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All these missions were made to fund the lunar program because of the pitiful reward currently offered for the landing and to also improve the know-how of the space corporation. Some very cheap and lucrative contracts for a change also showed up.

(There are no long tanks sized for probes, so TweakScale is also useful to scale down parts sometimes)

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Despite being dirty cheap, it was 100% recoverable.

Eventually there was less interest. Could it be possible to make a mission for only two tourists truly profitable?

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With some compromises it was entirely possible, and thus a lightweight three-seater variant of the Morgan Spaceliner Two was built for it.

Eventually fatigue kicked in due to constant touristic flights, a new astronaut had to be hired to share the burden.

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Azira was such new astronaut, and he was already sent to orbit with three lives under his responsibility in his first real mission.

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Fortunately he did it quite well.

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And after one more satellite, finally enough experience was gathered for another important step before taking chances with a moon landing.

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Although in truth these new rocket engines and boosters were not yet the ideal ones for a mission of such magnitude, specially because it would also be a touristic one to reduce the losses from how expensive it was predicted to be, the "Poodle" in particular would be very useful for a rocket capable of lifting and sending into a direct ascent to the Moon a lander with enough fuel to decelerate for landing and go back home. A direct ascent, because having neither docking mechanisms or communication technologies with enough range to reach the Moon, mimicking the Amerikwan moon landing was literally impossible and their technology was in fact considerably inferior to what the Apollo Program had available.

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Still, it was a goal to strive for, but first, R&D needed a long overdue upgrade, because being able to collect samples from the Moon would at least give some scientific justification for the involved expenses.

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This can land on the Mun without any difficulties. Of course the engine it used was nerfed in 1.0 so it would have to be slightly larger, but it's not even a fraction of the giant above

Optional audio

Xu-1 is vastly overshadowed by next and final step of the Xu Program, the towering, massive and astronomically expensive Xu-2, which was designed for a 2-manned direct ascent lunar landing with a sizable quantity of scientific systems for studies of the Moon at low orbit and surface. It has a tight Delta-V budget despite its price. The launch tower was replaced by a helicopter with a disembarking platform for the tourist who wants to go to the Moon and Bastard 4 because given the diameter of this thing at the bottom, even a minor inclination away from perfect 90 degrees during launch would risk a collision with a launch tower and there is no launch tower available with a twice longer platform.

Weighing nearly 4,000 tons, with an insane number of solid rocket boosters for the launch, this is one of the heaviest rockets ever built on Earth. And now the time has come for a mission that will even the African Union at last.

3, 2, 1, ignition!

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Thousands look upon the skies of the Republic of Congo in expectation for spotting a great beacon of dreams. Smoke and dust rises and the ground trembles under massive flames of several dozens of boosters. While lunar landings already happened, never a direct ascent one using only one launch was attempted. This design truly pushed the technology available to Morgan Insterstellar to the limit.

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Ejecting SRBs. Stage One complete. The second stage was a situation where several upscaled LVT-45 engines proved to be more economical than a single and much bigger one. At first TWR was limited, but eventually the angular maneuver began. The orbit of the Moon was not aligned with Earth's equator, so it was necessary to go for it. This was also about the right time, the right position of the Moon on the horizon for a launch from Makoua to align its orbit with the Moon.

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Slowly Xu-2 veered northwards for orbital alignment with the Moon.

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The angular difference was becoming smaller.

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After the second stage was empty, most of the remaining stages were moved by "Poodle" engines going progressively down in size.

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Whether their superior efficiency made up for being unable to accelerate at prograde without going down was a mystery.

(The guy who made a video of a manned Venus landing commented in one of his videos that it's more efficient to have more delta-V and a more inclined ascent angle than more TWR and less dV. I may be wrong but I think that as long as you can avoid losing altitude at 45 degrees inclination, it's ok)

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The next stage was designed for the lunar transfer, but there was a miscalculation and it was necessary to use some of its fuel for achieving a stable orbit.

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While such stage spent some fuel to finish the orbit, it still had enough fuel to probably do most of the Lunar direct ascent maneuver by its own.

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But the lander stage still had to be activated to finish it. Clearly if this is ever attempted again for a much better economic motivation, it will need even more boosters. Hopefully this will still be enough.

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Docking

At this point, there was no turning back. Xu-2 was on a collision landing course with the Moon. Given that things already didn't went as planned, for the lander had to use some of its fuel for the transfer, a suicide burn may be a necessity for landing without wasting too much fuel to be able to return home.

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Going to the Moon in a direct ascent during a new moon, specially without any means of lighting because for some funny reason Africa cannot into manufacturing space-worthy headlights, was perhaps the dumbest idea ever of Morgan Interstellar, but now it is too late. Trying to maneuver in a way that will make it land on the "day" side of the moon instead will cost too much fuel, and landing on the north pole would make the return to Earth too expensive to be possible.

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A minor, cheap course correction is made to ensure it will land closer to the lunar equator instead, while Bastard4 tries to futilely spot elevations from this far to ensure through his flight computer the landing will happen over a relatively plain surface, but in truth praying is the only thing to be done now.

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The sun will soon disappear in the horizon. Timing will be essential. Start burning too soon and there won't be enough fuel to go back home. Start burning too late and he will die and everything will fail. Fortunately the instructions from the engineers were crystal clear, but even the African engineers cannot into precise suicide burns.

( 360 noMechJeb

:M )

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Either this is not too late to start burning, or everyone will die. This will be a moment of either great glory or great sorrow while they look upon a far away Earth.

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The landing was certainly intense. The burn was not literally suicidal, for there was still some room for slowing down to optimize fuel consumption at times, but it was always very close to suicidal. Only a few more thousand meters before touchdown...

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:kfc:

HOORAY!

To increase stability fuel was transferred to the lander tank during landing, now the remaining fuel was being transferred back to the final stage, and hopefully it will be enough to return to Earth, to make this a truly great day for the African Union, the day their flag will wave proudly on the Moon.

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The scientific worth of the discoveries made here will be immense, provided Bastard4 manages to return alive with the reentry module in one piece. And after all, after being so close to death, he had only a few words to say about this monumental feat:

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:M

Bastard4 believed he was selected to the space program as a form of glorified death penalty for crimes he was accused of in the past, but of course, he dindu nuffin. In his mind, the fact he managed to pull this off vindicated his pleas of innocence.

With nobody to see it, although he could not remove his blackface makeup now, he finally stopped pretending to be a black dude, for he was as black as Rachel Dolezal and Shaun King. Although the African moon landing was not a hoax, the race and identity of the astronaut who did it was an enormous hoax, the real Bastard4 having died an inglorious death because of AIDS and crack cocaine overdose years ago and being too dumb to even point fireworks at the right direction, let alone fly a space rocket. It was all part of a glorified propaganda piece because Morgan Interstellar in truth employs mostly white people outside of menial jobs and Nwabudike Morgan hides very well the 50% of Caucasian DNA he has.

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And so, after waiting for the engines to cool down because they were overheating during the final seconds of the landing, the return trip commenced while the landing legs and lowermost fuel tank would remain on the Moon as evidence of this great feat.

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"Windhoek, we have a problem" Bastard4 thought considering how low fuel was, but he had nobody to speak to besides the tourist because the African communications technology still lacked range to reach the Moon and he would rather not give reasons for the tourist to freak out. There was more than enough for an orbit, but a harsh aerobraking maneuver was a must to return to Earth. As they gazed upon the sunny side of the Moon, Bastard4 also wondered: would there be enough for it? More importantly, he wondered about how to do the aerobraking without being burned to cinders during it.

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Phew, that one was like, totally tight. Just one minor maneuvering mistake, one less hundred in dV, and they would be doomed to die in orbit of the Moon or in Earth's orbit.

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Theme

After much thought, considering that normally reentry happens between 50k-46k periapsis for a Low Earth Orbit, given they would be passing much faster through Earth's atmosphere by then, Bastard4 went for a low risk, but likely long maneuver, for it would take probably days and multiple passes through atmosphere before reentry finally happened, and only then he would learn if he did it right.

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A very risky reduction of the orbit's eccentricity is attempted during the first pass where the last drops of fuel are spent.

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The empty tank and the radial engines are ejected, but because they generate more drag, they slowly approach the reentry module, and touch it again. This is very worrisome, but for some reason neither of the occupants of the module seem to be scared about it.

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The tank slides to the left of the final stage and after a while it explodes due to atmospheric entry, fortunately not close enough to endanger this mission despite how scary it looked at the moment.

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With 13 days of life support left, they could fortunately afford to spend days in orbit, and this would probably take a lot of time. Maybe the aerobraking could have been somewhat more aggressive without burning everything to ashes, but better safe than sorry.

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At least the sights were amazing while their fate remained uncertain.

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After several days and over a dozen of passes over Earth's atmosphere, the final moment approaches. A gigantic wealth of science awaits if this mission succeeds at last. Failure could spell the end of any ambitions farther than Earth's orbit for Morgan Interstellar, given how expensive such investment was. At least the landing was estimated to happen in the Pacific Ocean rather than in any tall mountains.

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The fact those material bays are open is concerning right now. Many compromises were made to ensure this thing would have the minimum dV needed to land on the Moon and return home without having an even more expensive cost. Not having a larger heat shield was one of such compromises, a compromise that may be very quickly regretted.

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The exposed materials bays began to burn. Quickly Bastard4 pitches the vessel up in an attempt to protect them before they blow up. The reentry module is hanging on by the skin of the teeth, and if those materials bays are lost, the parachutes will also be lost...

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By the skin of the teeth is a very apt description for how the reentry of this long lunar mission went by. Just one minor slip, one minor mistake in the maneuvering, and all would be lost. The Materials bays almost blew up, almost.

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Bastard4 already survived a very nasty reentry, but that one was nothing compared to this one.

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Whew. This was so close, so damn close. By the skin of the teeth, they made it!

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This will usher a new era for Morgan Interstellar and the African Union! A new era of unprecedented technological progress and rediscovery!

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Touchdown at last! The Xu Program is finally over as a complete success(over until safer and more economical means of exploring the Moon become available), and finally the real bounty from it can be acquired:

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:kfc: :kfc: :kfc:

Scientific progress beyond equal was achieved thanks to this great day!

Now new frontiers in space exploration await with new challenges and important decisions about where to focus the future efforts of Morgan Interstellar:


1) Making a Manned Missions to the farthest bodies of the solar system real, starting with Mars,for glory, prestige and very generous grants! (Requires considerable investment towards larger and larger fuel tanks and engines, nuclear included)

2) Economical Exploration of objects closest to Earth, starting with the mapping of all resources of the Moon and then the launch of modules to extract their most valuable ones, using unmanned missions to reduce risks. Includes uranium enrichment facilities that are totally not part of an evil overlord grade plan for world domination. (Requires considerable investment in better communications tech)

3) Economical Kolonization, construction of novelty Orbital Casinos for rich people among other avant-garde high tech zero-g entertainment services. Permanent moon bases and eventual civilian colonization of outer space in the Moon and beyond. (Requires heavy tech investment in multiple fields, will require some really, really, really big rockets to succeed)



TO BE CONTINUED ON PAGE 3
 
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Cassidy

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Everyone is playing Age of Decadence, but I'm going to bump this thread in the hopes someone will care to bring it to page 3, with a great pearl of wisdom:

Neanderthals be going to other planets with vacuum tubes and 1950's era rockets and making it look easy, too.

Biggest accomplishment at NASA since Wernher died is the black guy who turned out to be secretly masturbating every day in one of the far rows of the Mars Rover live feed monitoring room. They don't tell you that this brother was jerking his meat on a porn site when the Mars Rover stripped off its wheel liner and was disabled. He was directly responsible for the premature end of the billion dollar program. This is why black people will probably never make it to outer space. Unless we can afford to have personnel floating around in Zero-G constantly fapping. Unlikely it will be that cost effective any time soon.

Kwanstainia wins again.

Remember, give a brother a ride on a boat and he'll always need another one. Teach a brother to swim and that is probably the last you will see of that brother.

In all fairness, once the wheel liner was busted they tried to move the Rover without it by retracting that wheel permanently and turning it off. Sending this command caused the Rover to crash. They then rebooted it 60 times trying to get it to restart in this new configuration and each time the Rover crashed in bootup, pointing to a serious glitch in the software which real unit testing absolutely should have revealed before it was ever approved for deployment.

The hiring of this guy for the sake of affirmative action was one indication of wide incompetence at NASA. Serious problems caused by this terrible employee revealed that most of NASA was just as hopelessly incompetent at everything else. They have not changed an iota since they yelled "GO" for the Space Shuttle after just being informed the O-Ring seals on the tanks had been inspected and were severely compromised by temperature changes. So it turned out that NASA had made huge advances towards racial equality - the white people there are as f*cked up as the black people or in many cases much worse.
 

Cassidy

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Unfortunately there aren't many Cleve quotes related to Space stuff in the Codex, but I could go to Vault-Co for more

:M

It says a great deal for the overall brains of Germans that they were far better at identifying genius and cultivating such talent than your own people have ever been. Your race has mainly excelled at farting, watching spectator sports and screaming at monster truck rallies.

The State Department in America was almost exactly like the Nazis except with lower native intelligence and more farting. They captured Von Braun and told him in no uncertain terms, you were their bitch, now you will be our bitch. Von Braun answered to microcephalic insects at NASA who were not bright enough to deserve to get down on their knees and kiss his ass. As soon as the German scientists captured in WW2 began to die off, NASA turned into a gigantic internet cafe to surf high quality porno and masturbate during work hours, occasionally blowing up a space shuttle and killing all aboard. The Kwanzans after Von Braun never had anything resembling a space program again. You might as well put chimpanzees in charge of the Tilt-A-Whirl for all the sense it made for Kwans to try to do anything without people of Von Braun's calibre.

An empire of fail, which has come to the end of it's lucky streak. Going nowhere real fast.
 

exe

Augur
Joined
Sep 22, 2010
Messages
359
2
We are larping Morgan afterall
Increasing rewards sounds like a good idea, nothing kills fun like grinding.

edit: That was the most hilarious big rocket I have ever seen.
 

Cassidy

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That was the most hilarious big rocket I have ever seen.

Not really that big for realistic standards. It's merely somewhere between a Saturn V and a Nova. Shipping uranium and ore mining payloads to the Moon will probably require equally large rockets.
 

Burning Bridges

Enviado de meu SM-G3502T usando Tapatalk
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Tampon Bay
I know this is somewhat unrelated, but Congo actually continued German V2 technology.

It was a huge success like everything the Congo does.

 

Cassidy

Arcane
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Do any of you know how to fix a broken 1.0.4 save that ends with clicking anywhere in the Space Center doing nothing and all menus freezing to make it work in 1.0.5?

If there is no fix to that, then other than an update I already have the screenshots for, this one will be over.
 

Data4

Arcane
Joined
Sep 11, 2005
Messages
5,529
Location
Over there.
Wish I could help you with that, Cassidy

I've somehow borked my 1.0.5 install. Everything works, but it's slower than fuck with very little active vessels. I'm thinking it's a plugin issue, since I've gone through and manually pruned a ton of fuel tanks, since I use procedural tanks, along with other stuff I don't use. It sucks too, because I've made a shuttle based on the real thing that I really like. I think I can save the .craft file and just add the mods I used into a new install, but I hesitate until I know exactly what's killing my performance.

Obligatory screenshot from my album:

 

Cassidy

Arcane
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Why recreate space shuttles? So chronic fappers in the gigantic cybercafe for porn NASA became since all geniuses like Von Braun died can blow one up occasionally?

:ibelieveincleve:

(obviously, this is also a bump)
 

Data4

Arcane
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Over there.
:lol: Call it part love affair with the ol' money pit, part engineering challenge. Mix in a little spaceLARP, et voila.
 

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
Sep 9, 2007
Messages
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Here one of my finest designs. TweakScale is a great mod:

XUAEGBJ.jpg


Yo Dawg i herd you like probes so we put two probes in yo probe so you can probe while u probe.

*Edit: Good news. After changing BetterTimeWarp settings that save is working perfectly again. Now onto the next page!
 
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